Koko ni oide (Come to me)
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: Juubei reminiscences about his relationship with Kazuki and how Kazuki is like the human form of the moon.


**Fandom: Get Backers  
Title: Koko ni oide. (Come to me.)  
Pairing: Juubei + Kazuki  
Rating: PG  
Description: Juubei reminiscences about his relationship with Kazuki and how Kazuki is like the human form of the moon****.**

**Disclaimer: Get Backers isn****'****t mine.**

**Koko ni oide. (Come to me.)  
By miyamoto yui  
**

Do you know what it means to be completely asleep with both of your eyes open? Do you know what it means to be in a dream and never get out of it because it is the reality that has been set out for you? Even these descriptions were insufficient.

But this was the best I could say about it. There is only one person who has made me feel this way. And I don't think anyone could understand the confusion that I have inside of my mind.

I didn't know this until I became physically blind to the world. I used to wander around with my hands groping anything to make sure that I was real. But that didn't matter when I met Kazuki.

Who said that men had to wear "the proper attire"? Who cared if I had mistaken him for a woman? Could you put a label on beauty? Was there any human word to describe such a state of ecstasy that went through my whole mind and body as I absorbed the image of this wonderfully, alluring person in front of me?

He wasn't the sun or anything of that sort. He was the mysterious moon that dwelled in its existence. It was far away and you couldn't see it all the time. It had many faces…

Angry, sad, happy, calm. I had seen Kazuki through all these phases in life. I had seen it with my own two eyes.

When I was chosen to be his protector, at first, I resented it. I thought that this wasn't fair at all.  
Why did I have to devote myself to someone that I knew nothing about? I didn't even know what this person looked like. What more for the other people in my family that I heard about. I wondered what I would think about this person.

Why was I preparing myself to die for a stranger?

But among the reeds, and looking at that person through the frame of a den, I saw a painting. I saw a very expressive painting. Someone whose eyes were subdued and deep in concentration. I stared until I  
thought that I could consume the image and keep it all to myself. And then I found out that it wasn't just something beautiful to look at it.  
He looked at me and smiled in my direction.

Then, the anxieties I felt were dripping away from my fingers. There was something in those eyes that told, "I don't need you" and "Save me" at the same time. This made no sense to me, but it did.

That was the nature of the one named Kazuki.

From then on, I knew the world had turned upside down. As my training became more vigorous, I knew something had changed within me: There was a purpose.

All this time, when I was told of someone to protect, I thought of it as a burden. Who wanted to give their life away to someone they didn't even know? Why did I have to be born into this household?  
It was like a distant memory that you were trying to recall, a past life. You knew you came from somewhere and that you were heading towards someone or something, but nothing along the way helped to make any of it real. They were just there. That's what you had been told. That was just the way things were and you couldn't change them.

But when I looked into those eyes, contrasting in their messages, I became obsessed to become better and better for him.

I took him to Mugenjyou because that was what he had been instructed to do. But I was unsure in some part of my mind. Except, I had to act strong. Was I strong enough to protect this person? He was very strong and calm at the same time, and I had to become even stronger than that. Strong like a wall that nothing could touch.

Unless it came to Kazuki's tears.

He cried even though he didn't want to show me. The only thing I could do was go to an alleyway and hug him with all of my heart. In this darkness, no one could see him. I shielded him even from the moonlight. I didn't want anyone or anything seeing him this way.

The Kazuki I knew wasn't weak at all…

Being locked away from the world, he only knew the surface of functioning within it. He knew all kinds of ways to attack or the proper way to behave, but it was nothing like his household. The walls that enclosed him were with him until then. And I didn't want him to change. Adjust, but not change from the way things had always been.

Look for a way to survive with him…  
Provide his three meals, look for shelter…

Because I loved this person, I pushed through without a word. He always asked me if there was something he could do, but I wouldn't allow him to. I'd change the subject and we would train. It was more of a dance.

He would spread his hands wide with his strings in between us and I would hold my hands out ready to attack. Back and forth, bend backwards, kick…

He would lean one hand on the ground while I would lean forward with a blade to his neck. A string would touch lightly on my back as he lightly touched over my cheek. I'd try to jump away.

I loved practicing with him.

When it was nighttime, after dinner, we would practice until there were no more spectators. In this dance, we walked around one another, but I would be caught by the wind.

One time, he pinned me to the ground and he sat on my stomach. He gave me a glare with all his seriousness darting itself at me. I looked at him, but then, he took off my sunglasses. He laughed at my stupidity.

The moon was shining high in the sky.

But here was its human form.

He smiled as the bells in his hair chimed. "I win this round."  
With a calm expression, I told him seriously, "You'll always win."  
"You let me win?" he asked me, a bit offended.  
"No, it's nothing like that."  
"What do you mean?" He leaned forward until I could feel his breath on my face.

Looking away, I blushed a bit in embarrassment. Too honest for my own good, I couldn't come up with a good response and so I remained silent.

His eyes pierced into me and he became angry. "I hate it when you do this, Juubei."

I turned my head to face him as his tears dropped onto my face. His hands crumpled my shirt between his fingers. It made me cringe.

"You always think you have to do it alone," he said in a soft voice. "You never complain and you never want to burden me."  
Then, he opened his eyes and more droplets of water splattered on my face. "Don't you trust me, Juubei? Why won't you tell me anything?"

I held half of his face with one hand and rubbed away his tears with my thumb. "Kazuki, it isn't that."

I was dying with all his tears on me. Why was it the person I wanted most to protect was the one I hurt the most?

"Then why?" He then let go of his grip on my clothing and pulled up my sleeves. "All the jobs you do are this hard that you get hurt?"  
I looked up at him silently.  
"You always tell me 'I'll take care of it' with a smile. You never want me to do anything." He shook his head. "Don't you see what you're doing?"

It was then that I felt my heart become even more suffocated. Things were beginning to dawn on me as his pained face embedded itself into my memory.

"You're treating me like when I was home. It's not that I don't appreciate everything you've done." He closed his eyes and whispered into my ear as he laid his head on my shoulder. "Kamisama knows how much I love you, but…  
"…but you treat me like a doll. That all I've got to do is perform what I need to and look good." Then, his voice became even softer. "As awful as it may seem…"

His hand went over my chest and wrapped around my waist. He held me tightly as if he would lose me if he didn't. "As awful as you may think of me, I was kind of glad that we came to Mugenjyou. I could start all over again. I thought, 'Juubei is here so I know it will be all right.'"

I closed my eyes, unable to cry aloud but I was deep inside. Had I done all that?

"I'm sorry, Kazuki. I didn't mean it that way." I said as I put my arms around his delicate frame of a body. I enwrapped him between my arms like the first time we came here.

"All I wanted to do was for you to be happy." I sighed. "I was trying my best so that you wouldn't have to feel more pain. I knew how you were living, but I didn't know I put you in that same position."

He shook his head. "I know, Juubei. But what I am trying to tell you is thank you. Thank you for always thinking so much about me, but sometimes you have to think about yourself.  
"You don't know how much it hurts that you won't let me share the sufferings and happiness that you go through."  
"Sufferings I can take easily because I am happy with the way things are." I laughed. "I knew that the very moment you looked up from practicing on the koto."

It was then that he smiled at me.

We came to this mutual understanding and from then on, our bond became stronger. With only a single look, we knew what the other was thinking without a word aloud.

So now, as I looked up to the direction of the moon, I knew it was there. I couldn't see it with my eyes anymore, but I could tell. On the day you showed me how much I had hurt you, that was when I realized what was the true meaning of the moonlight. They were the tears of the moon.

For what was the moon? It was a cold surface covered in craters and its own deformity. Little by little, it was giving itself away, so painfully. And yet, it was still so awesome. In all its beauty, the moon wanted to be looked at for more than that. It wanted to feel everything and exist with everything around it.

So, the moonlight proved the moon's existence, saying, "Save me" in its weakness and "I don't need you" with its pride.

The wind blew and the bells in his hair tinkled.

At that moment, Kazuki's forehead touched mine. I could hear the smile in his voice. "Juubei? Why do you always point yourself towards the moon?"  
"I don't. I just feel you're there, Kazuki."

On Earth, the moonlight was the only thing you could see and touch in the moon's ephemeral existence. And for me, you, Kazuki, are the only real thing in the world.

So, that's why I have to be this strong. I have to be much stronger than the moon so that you can exist so strong, so wonderful, so powerful…

Watching you,  
watching me,  
for always,  
I'll be with you.

It was then that I took his face into my hands and kissed his forehead.  
**  
Owari. / The End.**

**Author****'****s notes: **I don't know what this is, but there was something that I wanted to say about the couple. I don't know why, but it was today that I was inspired for them.

**April 30, 2004**


End file.
